


White Christmas

by GretchenSinister



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Cancer, Gen, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-30
Updated: 2019-01-30
Packaged: 2019-10-19 05:40:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17595509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister
Summary: Original Prompt: "We all know most kids at some point in their lives stop believing in the guardians. It’s sad when a kid finds a receipt for their Christmas gift from Santa, or the Easter bunny never came.May someone write a piece on how parents help guardians to do their duties when there isn’t enough manpower, can’t meet deadlines, etc. For example, a lot of gifts kids want have brands (like Hasbro), so Santa doesn’t make these toys, but the adults help by buying these toys - which explain found receipts or such (which was poor hiding on the parent’s behalf).Maybe some parents are able to see the guardians, or may be old friends with the guardians when they caught Santa putting gifts under the tree or woke up when Tooth put a quarter under their pillow as a child."NOT a fic for White Christmas the pairing.The title refers to something else. Probably not what you’re expecting either.North has a conversation with Nina, the mother of two children, on Christmas Eve. He has a few thoughts about the constraints of his duties.





	White Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr on 10/11/2013.

“Oh, thank goodness.” North hears the words as soon as he steps out of the air into the small living room of a house with no chimney. The voice doesn’t belong to a child, and the words are heavy as they hit his ear. He sets down his pack, and looks around the room until he finds the source of that voice, a woman wrapped in a pale blue robe sitting in a worn beige recliner, her feet tucked up beneath her. Upon looking at her, he knows at once that she’s the mother of the two children who live in this house.  
  
When she sees that he isn’t about to vanish or tell her to look away, she smiles in relief, though North can see an underlying sadness in her expression. She puts down the papers she had been holding, careful not to upset the half empty glass of wine on the collapsible side table next to the chair.  
  
“I was worried that you wouldn’t come this year,” she says. “Come on into the kitchen, if you have time. I want you to have milk straight from the fridge with the cookies.”  
  
It’s unclear to Nina, when she sits down in the chair again and North sits at one edge of the couch, how there are now two small plates with cookies on them resting on the little table between them. She gives a mental shrug and nibbles on hers while continuing to sip her wine. It’s not like a little magic should worry her now.  
  
“Why were you worried I would not come this year?” North asks, his voice softer than usual.  
  
Nina’s smile this time isn’t really a smile, and her face looks drawn in the cheerful red, green, blue, and yellow light from the strings of bulbs threaded around the somewhat unconvincing artificial tree.  
  
“It’s been that kind of year. The kids know more than they let on, you know. I wouldn’t have been surprised if they…hadn’t been expecting you either.”  
  
“Here I am, all the same.”  
  
Nina nods, and takes a deep breath. For a little while, they eat their cookies in silence.  
  
After glancing over at the tree for a moment—it’s a particularly admirable tree, in North’s expert opinion: nearly all the ornaments are handmade, and they’re the kind Tooth would like too: full of memories—when North looks back at Nina, she’s using the heel of her hand to rub at the corner of her eye. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she says, her voice wavering. “I couldn’t—I couldn’t have done it alone this year. There were—I had to—the tests weren’t covered—”  
  
North reaches out for her hand, and she takes his, tears falling steadily from her eyes now.  
  
“Is it all right?” She asks, half rising from her chair, and North nods. She gets up and takes the two steps to North, climbing into his lap and hugging him as best she can. North holds her close, thinking how since he became who he is, he’s grown so tall that all mortals are child-sized to him.  
  
“The children know enough,” he tells her, “that I could not bring as much as I wanted too.” Then again, in situations like this, he never can. “But I have made the toys with the best magic I can. They will not break until Liza and Thomas do not need them anymore.”  
  
Nina’s silent tears turn into wracking sobs, and she fumbles for the papers on the table while half-burying her face in North’s coat. “Why,” she says, bringing the translucent gray plastic of an x-ray to the front of the pile and shoving it at him, “Why couldn’t you have made  _me_?”  
  
There’s more white between the bars of her ribs than there’s snow on the ground outside.  
  
He bends his head over her protectively, but can’t resist glancing out the window at the cold, waning moon. It was fine, being a Guardian of Childhood, wasn’t it? Being able help  _only_  the children?  
  
He’d like to get Manny down here someday. Make him see that, in the end, they were all children.


End file.
